


Shimmer

by Lorelaia



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Domestic!Avengers, M/M, Slash with your goggles on
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-28
Updated: 2012-10-28
Packaged: 2017-11-17 05:21:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/548051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lorelaia/pseuds/Lorelaia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Other Guy flickers through the glass, strips of green broken by the endless spiral of lights outside – a burning spire of gold, blue, red. He breathes through his nose and listens to the broken silence of the city, closing his eyes and listening for the flutter of trees and of the murmurs of wildlife, of horns blaring in the night and of voices blending into an incomprehensible song.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Insomnia strikes on a summer's night, and spires of light break through the fragile moonlight. They'll talk in the morning. Until then, he dreams.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shimmer

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kelli113](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kelli113/gifts).



There is a certain kind of silence that settles over New York during a summer night. It is heavy and raw and barely quiet at all, filled with the heady rumbles of a city that never sleeps. Even in the heights of Stark Tower the sound intrudes, a low white noise beneath the hum of the air conditioning and soft slow creaks of a building at night.

 

On nights when Bruce can’t sleep, he curls one hand on the thick glass of the window and watches from dizzying heights the world beyond his room. The Other Guy flickers through the glass, strips of green broken by the endless spiral of lights outside – a burning spire of gold, blue, red. He breathes through his nose and listens to the broken silence of the city, closing his eyes and listening for the flutter of trees and the murmurs of wildlife, of horns blaring in the night and of voices blending into an incomprehensible song.

 

Yet on other nights, when even the whispers of India can’t break the melancholy of New York’s song and his fist curls white-knuckled in the sheets, he leaves the sanctuary of his room to wander restless and shivering through the depths of the Tower. The Other Guy whispers through his mind, a shudder of motion in the corner of his eyes – a ghost trickling across windows and walls, a shiver of green across his hands. Bruce doesn’t look up, trusting his feet to know the steps, bleary and sleep-sick painted red, blue and gold in the broken silence of the New York night.

 

“Bruce?”

 

The Other Guy leers, a shimmer of green across the polished silver of the refrigerator, the glide of a palm across marble benches. Bruce blinks, disorientated, as pale blue floods his fingers between the shimmers of gold; brief lashes of ice across his strong palms and fingers amongst rings of green. Colour fades, darkness intruding, but the blue light remains steady and Bruce breathes, just breathes, before meeting Tony’s eyes across the bench.

 

“Tony.”

 

The other man’s eyes are wild, shadows black beneath the surprisingly large orbs, a nervous tic dancing in the billionaire’s jaw. His hair is a mess, a tumble of dark strands weighed down with grease and sweat, his arms trembling with fatigue as he sits hunched at the bench. Only his fingers are moving, an electric dance between shimmers of ice and gold, blue and red, an endless tempo against the marble of the bench. In the glass coffee cup he nurses in one hand a green eye blinks.

 

Bruce stumbles forward to the bench, too tired to be self conscious of his lack of grace, breathing beneath Tony’s dark-eye stare. Though the billionaire says nothing he gestures with his chin, a pale motion towards the stools perched beneath the surface of the bench. Bruce snares one with an ankle and sits with the grace of a man who hasn’t slept for forty-five hours, but Tony merely lifts his coffee to take a sip as the Other Guy bares his teeth in a smile. Bruce blinks again and the lights flicker gold.

 

“Pepper says it’s bad for me,” Tony says, a blunt mutter against the rim of his cup, and Bruce lifts his gaze from his hand curled white-fisted on the bench – green in the shadow of the ice blue light – to stare across at the other man. Tony swallows, a thick gulp of coffee strong enough to make Bruce’s heart thud from across the bench, and sits his cup back down. It sloshes over the bench, a thick black stain, and Bruce watches as it burns red in a sudden spire of light. “That I won’t sleep.”

 

He smiles, wan and without pity, and Bruce reads Tony’s thoughts in the twitch of sensual lips and the flutter of fingers against marble. Unconsciously he looks down, studying the length of those fingers and hands – long and strangely fragile against the pale marble, knicked and scarred in the burst of gold light – as they dance a crescendo against marble and Tony swallows again. When he looks up Tony’s smile is gone, his large eyes dark and blank in the brief moonlight, before a shiver of red catches the flutter of his eyelashes and Bruce lowers his gaze to his hand.

 

“Like it makes a difference,” the billionaire mumbles, and Bruce feels his own exhaustion like a physical weight as Tony lifts his cup with a hand that is trembling. His other hand beats desperately, a broken tattoo, and the Other Guy laughs in the gleam of the patented StarkWatch wrapped around Tony’s wrist. Bruce is barely conscious of leaning forward onto the bench, the dark stain of the lukewarm coffee lapping his sleeve as he braces his chin in his palm and fights not to close his eyes.

 

“Maybe she’s right,” Bruce manages finally, lips responding reluctantly to the instructions of his tongue, voice hoarse and broken in the shadows of not-night. The aircon hums, a white whisper against his mind, and in the heady summer night he meets Tony’s gaze across the bench. Tony stares back at him, exhaustion heavy across his features and trembling through his lithe form, and in the glimmer of blue through the large windows his eyes are liquid and broken. Bruce feels himself stir, his hand reaching out to push down Tony’s cup and the green face that glimmers within.

 

“Bruce-“

 

“Hush,” he murmurs, pulling the cup from Tony’s unresisting hand, and clutching the long slim palm in his own. He feels the pound of Tony’s pulse against the pads of his fingers, a drum beat in the shadows of golden light, and Bruce swallows against the broken night. He stands, drawing Tony with him, and in the shadow of the fridge the Other Guy looms over Tony’s shoulder with an expression Bruce is too tired to interpret. Tony stumbles into his arms, breathing tight and hard against his neck, and his wrist still held in Bruce’s hand echoes the beat of his heart.

 

“JARVIS-“

 

There is a momentary static, as if the AI has only just woken, and in the shadow-play of blue and gold Bruce catches Tony’s eyes. Wide dark eyes glimmer with captured light, careful and confused, but his nose is pressed against Bruce’s neck and his breath is even and unafraid. Bruce releases Tony’s wrist to press one warm hand to Tony’s back, strong and wide against the thin fabric of the billionaire’s shirt, and in the heavy silence between the beats of his heart gold shimmers across slivers of marble.

 

“Master Bruce,” JARVIS whispers, a bare second of noise, but neither man stirs in the broken light. Bruce licks his lips, his heart a tattoo in his breast, and in the shudder of brief moonlight Tony swallows against his neck. “Sir’s suite has been unlocked.”

 

The AI’s voice trails off, soft and tentative, and Bruce turns. He pulls Tony with him, hands flickers of motions in the night; desperate and trembling in starbursts of gold, blue and red. The Other Guy glimmers across the glass of the arc reactor, but the glow of his eye is wondering and small as Tony twines his fingers with Bruce’s own. The billionaire looks at him askance, tired and still, a wondering curve to those trembling lips, chocolate eyes liquid caught with shimmers of burning gold.

 

Bruce tightens his hand in Tony’s and leads them through the broken stillness of the Tower, green flicking across windows between shadows of blue, red and gold. At the end of the hall he pushes open Tony’s door with a hand stained green and red, and behind him Tony breathes a low hitching sigh. Shadows tremble through flickers of light as Bruce draws Tony with him step by step to the opulently large bed, the windows wide and clear, and in flickers of light Bruce parts his lips to whisper an instruction. Something shifts within the Tower and without a sound the windows fade to shivers of black, only soft blue light still trembling as the door slides slowly shut. In the artificial night Bruce pulls Tony down onto the bed, breathless and pliant, and draws the billionaire into his embrace. Tony curls against his chest, breath soft and slow, brown eyes fluttering in the ice blue light, lips curving around the shadows of a word.

 

“In the morning,” Bruce whispers, a soft sound too gentle to be chiding, and draws the sheets towards them with a hand glimmering in blue shadows of light. JARVIS hums somewhere, or maybe Tony does, and the aircon whispers against his ears. For the first time in two days Bruce closes his eyes and hears the whisper of trees against the full curve of a golden moon and the murmur of voices too distant to understand. In his arms Tony sighs soft and warm against him, nosing at the juncture between shoulder and neck, and falls still and quiet beneath the white noise of the city and the hum of the aircon.

 

“Thank you,” JARVIS whispers, but Bruce doesn’t hear.

 

He dreams of cities, and trees, and lights striped blue and gold across the shadows of a green sky. They will talk in the morning.

 

Until then, he dreams.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Glimmer](https://archiveofourown.org/works/548096) by [kelli113](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kelli113/pseuds/kelli113)




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